


Stranded

by QueenoftheHobbits



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, Female Identifying reader, Merman Bucky, hopefully a different take on this au, mermaid au, period set
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-19
Updated: 2017-08-19
Packaged: 2018-12-17 00:23:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 10,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11840136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenoftheHobbits/pseuds/QueenoftheHobbits
Summary: Merman Bucky AU: You find yourself stranded on a desert island no thanks to a stupid group of pirates…you happen to make a friend, however, who’s determined to show you how to survive.





	1. Part 1

“You can’t do this!” You struggled against the men holding you in that tiny rowboat, wishing simply to be let back onto the ship, to not have been tossed aside for the sake of good luck. Stupid superstitions.

“I am the captain, lass, I can do whatever I want.” You’re dragged off the row boat by the rope binding your hands and shoved onto the sand. They all curse you and laugh, rowing back to the damned ship.

Your hands are still bound when they sail away, jeers being called over at you, undistinguishable words, but you understood the message. You shakily stood up on weak legs, looking around. The island they had left you on started with a sandy beach that lead into what looked like a more forested interior. It wasn’t by any means a small island, but neither was it large.

If you hadn’t been stranded here, left for dead, in but a mere nightdress you might have thought it beautiful because in an odd, wild sort of way it was. It wasn’t the beauty of marbled halls or Whitehall or Rome, but it was beautiful in its own sort of way. At least it was warm…although that usually meant it was cold at night and your cotton nightdress was not exactly made for keeping you warm.

You pushed through the sand in your slippers, slowly taking in the array of shells and driftwood that littered the ground before reaching the tree line, at least there was enough wood and bits of flint around to make a fire to keep you warm at night. You push towards the tree line, noting a small stream further in the trees. Water, at least there’s water. You could see a few coconut trees and you were sure there was more edible vegetation further inland…but you weren’t sure you wanted to explore that just yet. It was nearing sundown as it was and you wanted to get a fire going before it got dark.

You weren’t a survivalist, really you were just a girl who’d lived in the city and gotten bored of the lack of opportunity. You’d wanted to try something new and getting caught on a ship wasn’t exactly part of the plan, neither was getting thrown onto a desert island…but you had to make do. Surely a Naval vessel would come by at some point?

“I can’t believe…stupid…so stupid.” You mumble to yourself as you grab wood and flint and that piece of metal that had washed up on the shore. You find yourself a spot clear and far enough in land on the beach that the tide wouldn’t touch you.

You try to set up a little bundle of sticks, some dry grass you found into a mound that might just work as a fire. You have made fires before, had to set your old fireplace ablaze without matches and so you were confident that at least this was something you could do. That even if you were rubbish at finding food or making shelter at least you knew how to keep yourself warm. You take the piece of metal and flint, bashing them against each other, flint sliding over metal, again and again and again until a spark flies and hits the kindling. You watch with relief as it starts to burn, more kindling, more wood until it was an adequate fire. Something to keep you warm now that the sun is going down.

You hear a splash and a slap of something wet and solid against a stone from behind you and you turn suddenly terrified that this island might just be inhabited by something that wants to kill you. To your utter surprise there isn’t some wild cat or monstrous beast standing behind you, but a fish. Dead and lying there on a rock just at the edge of the water.

Part of you thinks you should really question where this fish suddenly came from, but you’re growling stomach says otherwise. It could have just jumped and killed itself? Or maybe another animal killed it and left at the sight of you?

The true reason for the fish watches you from behind some rocks, head barely poking out of the water, long hair wet against their neck. They watch you curiously as you take the fish, and watch as you spear it with a stick, sharpened with flint, and place it over your fire. They’ve seen fire before but only where humans are…you can’t eat raw things like they can. They like watching, you humans are curious creatures and as dangerous as you could be you were also interesting to watch.

The truth was that your watcher was concerned for you. Humans were not resilient and many were terrible at looking after themselves, those towns and cities they had created made so many of them complacent and terrible at surviving. They wanted to help had seen that you’d been victim to your own kind and…the watcher was alone too, knew how hard it could be alone with no one to help. So they helped. So they would help.

The fish was lovely, as much as you felt like you were being watched (you put that down the quiet stillness that was this island, and the animals that were probably watching your fire in fear) you were grateful to have found that fish, you had been hungry and you weren’t a fisherman nor where you much of a forager. The food felt like a gift, a blessing and you savoured it even if you’d overcooked it slightly. You kept some of the larger bones, perhaps you’d be able to use them for something? You figured that on this island you would need to keep everything, even the tiny things in case they became useful.

You stoked the fire once more, before settling down. Your watcher found it amusing, the way you curled up in on yourself, as close to the fire as you could do safely. But also found it sad. Sad that you must have been cold and perhaps uncomfortable. You did not have a home anymore…and they wished to help you make one…as dangerous as humans could be you looked anything but.

If their family were still alive they would be cursing them for getting so close to a human, for interacting. Reckless they’d say. Stupid. Dangerous.

But how could a creature that curls up so small, and cries so softly be dangerous?


	2. Part 2

Fish kept turning up dead, you’d been on the island for what you’d marked out on a tree as 3 days. 3 days in which you’d found that stream to be more than just a stream, it stemmed from a river which made your life so much easier. 3 days in which you’d found root vegetables you had no name for and berries which you’d tried at your own risk luckily having picked the good ones. Nonetheless the fish kept turning up. In the morning you’d wake to a fish, mid-day you’d come back from foraging to a fish, and at night after rebuilding your fire you’d find a fish. Always the same rock and always dead.

At this point you were more than aware that the fish couldn’t be just dying and landing on the same rock every time. You were increasingly aware of that rock and wondered if you weren’t taking some poor animals food that it had left there for later.

It wasn’t until the trinkets started turning up that you realised it couldn’t be as simple as that either. No animal would be leaving you fish and trinkets. They were always things that obviously had been abandoned in the ocean; a broken mirror, tangled necklaces, coinage that no one used anymore. Shiny things, little things. Things that most people would discard, throw away. But you needed anything you could get…and part of you knew these were gifts, items given to you. Things you should keep not because they’re useful, but because they were given.

Your watcher preens almost with pride at you taking the trinkets, they’re gifts. They have no idea if they are useful, but they are pretty and shiny and they hope that you like them. That they make your time on this island better. They know that humans don’t live like this, they live in groups, in towns, cities, places with buildings and food. Your watcher is sure that this is more survival than living for you, that it is not fun. Maybe the shiny things will make it easier for you.

You like the trinkets, you spend your time untangling the necklaces and cleaning the mirror to make it shine again. Your reflection is weary and worn. Your hair is a tangled mess that try as you might you can’t untangle on your own. Your skin is rougher from the time outside and your eyes look tired. You look worn, not that you hadn’t always. Life had never been easy for you, but being stranded on a desert island had made the problems worse.

Each day you felt more confident in your survival, the discovery of edible plants and a relatively clean water source made you feel better. You tried to use your common sense each day, to avoid doing anything that would ruin the work you had done. You weren’t a survivalist and you knew that many of the great inventions that time had created were because of more than one person. You were one person, trying to figure out how to do things that people had been doing for centuries.

You were glad that the island didn’t have any predators on it. The few animals you’d seen were birds and the occasional small mammal, which you were sure you could eat if you needed to, but you rather preferred the fish. After all there was a supply of fish that one person couldn’t deplete, the mammals you weren’t sure about. Eating a whole species to extinction didn’t sit well with you. So instead you took the mysteriously appearing fish and wondered if you could learn to spear fish like some people did, you couldn’t make a fishing rod but a big pointy stick? You could make a big pointy stick, right?

That’s what you spent your day doing, hunting down the perfect length stick and sitting down on the beach with a sharp piece of flint, slowly shaving away bits of wood. It was harder in practice than it was in theory, mostly because it took a lot of energy and your muscles weren’t as strong as you thought they were. It was one thing lifting something, it was another thing trying to use a sharp piece of stone to shape the end of a stick into a sharp enough point that you _might_ be able to get some fish with it. Might being the operative word, considering you’d never done it before and you had a feeling that it was a lot harder than it sounded.

By the time you’d finished the sun was setting and you turned to look at the rock, knowing you’d see a fish there. Only, today you saw a hand, a very human hand, place the fish on the rock followed by a splash and the sight of a large, silvery blue, almost pearlescent tail as whoever, whatever, left the fish swam away. The tail gleamed in the dying light, delicate fins like tissue paper or chiffon.

They were just stories, you thought, as you started your nightly fire and retrieved that fish. They were just stories told in port towns and by parents to little kids. Stories of half human half fish people, of mermaids, of mermen. Creatures that had beautiful tails. Creatures that drowned sailors or could grant wishes with just a scale. They were just stories…and yet you didn’t believe that anymore, you didn’t believe yourself.

How could you? How else would you have seen a human hand place a fish on that rock before a beautiful tail swam away? How could you deny that that looked like a merperson, that that looked like a merperson was feeding you, looking after you.

Your watcher swam in panic, you’d glimpsed their hand. You’d seen them. You weren’t supposed to see them.


	3. Part 3

When you woke up the next morning there wasn’t a fish on that rock and you had the feeling you’d scared your helper away, that you’d scared the merperson from helping you. You instead found yourself sitting on that rock, staring out at the sea. Blue and deep and dangerous.

“I don’t know who you are…but thank you. For feeding me. For the shiny things.” You called out to the ocean, part of you felt ridiculous, but part of you hoped that they’d hear and that maybe they’d come back, maybe they’d talk to you, help you. Being alone was hard. 4 days and you hadn’t talked to a single soul. It was grating on you slowly, bit by bit.

It was increasingly a dower thought that maybe your helped wouldn’t come back, maybe you’d scared them off for good. Maybe you were finally alone. “I’m sorry if I scared you…I suppose merpeople don’t really like us much? Stories and all make us out to be rather mean I suppose.” So many stories about mermaids mentioned sailors hurting them, stealing their scales, killing them, capturing them. They were stories, but maybe they had a truth, maybe once upon a time people knew about them and hurt them.

“I don’t know what I’m doing…as you can probably tell and I’d really like someone to talk to so…if you could come back even just to fish for me again? I could find you stuff in payment? Do you have a currency?” You wondered if merpeople used coins or something similar or did they just trade items? Or were they just naturally helpful?

“I don’t know much about merpeople…and I’m sorry if I offended you. So I’ll just…be here. If you need me.” Not that a merperson would ever need you, what could you offer to someone who could fish and survive and swim. You could barely build a fire each night.

You spent the next 2 lonely days trying to teach yourself how to fish with a pointy stick.  The first day had been frustrating, fish would come close to you only to dart away, your reflexes incredibly poor, by the second day you caught one fish…it was better than the day before. Other than that fish you’d been eating root vegetables, berries, fruit, and a few coconuts you’d managed to bash against rocks until they’d opened. You felt like you spent all the energy you gained from food getting more food.

You went out that day back into the trees. You washed in the river and drank some water, before exploring deeper. You came back with an armful of firewood and the knowledge that the trees were so deep you could easily get lost. Returning to your little camp on the beach you stopped still as your gaze naturally fell to that rock.

On the rock was a sodden pile of clothes or fabric, you couldn’t quite tell. When you reached them it was obviously these clothes weren’t old, relatively new in fact, just incredibly wet as if they’d been dragged half way across the ocean…and they might well have been. You took them and rested them out on a few rocks in the sun before returning to the particular rock placing an opened coconut and some other fruit you’d found down.

“Thank you!” You call out, leaving the items as payment before returning to your little camp. You were grateful that you’d been stranded somewhere warm and not somewhere cold, at least you could handle the heat, but you would have easily died somewhere without sun, fruit and water.

The items aren’t dry by nightfall and you make a weird sort of wooden structure out of sticks to hang them on by your fire.

Nights are so lonely. Alone. In the dark with your little fire. A week you’d been here. 2 days you’d gone without your helper, 2 days and you’d missed the help dearly, but also missed the awareness that you weren’t completely isolated. It was nice to know that there was someone else again. Merperson or not.

You’re thankful for the help, for the fish, for the clothes to replace your own ragged ones. But you’re also glad for the lack of isolation. Feeling completely alone was horrible, whether your helper ever wished to talk to you or not didn’t matter. What mattered was that you weren’t completely alone. You had someone trying to help you. Silent or not. You had someone who didn’t want you to die.

It was the first time in a long time that you felt like someone was on your side.


	4. Part 4

The new clothes do not fit quite right, but you can wear them and they’re better than the ragged clothes you’d been wearing for a week. You now have 2 different outfits, you can wash clothes, alternate. It makes you feel better kept, less messy. You can’t thank your silent helper enough, strange as it is, and strange as the thought that merpeople are real is. You might not have truly seen them, might have only seen flashes, but that was enough to confirm it for you. That tail could belong to nought but a merperson.

You’d been organising your little camp just a bit more, planning really. Thinking about making some sort of shelter in case a storm blew in. Rain while obviously not frequent was still something that would happen and being stuck in a storm wasn’t your idea of fun. Not that you really knew how to make a shelter, wood, some rope maybe? Those vines in the forest could work? You had absolutely no idea.

“Hello” When a sudden voice came from behind you, male and friendly, but so sudden that you let out a tiny scream and physically jumped from the fright. You’d been alone, for so long, well, alone without anyone to speak with, but not quite alone, that it scared you.

You turned around to see him, or at least by human standards he was a him, sitting? Lounging on the rock. His tail was just as you remember it silvery blue, almost pearlescent, with finds like chiffon. It looked delicate and yet you were sure it was strong enough to hurt. He was what you would probably say was tall if he were human, long brown hair at his shoulders, wet from the water, with the starting of a beard across an impressive jawline. Blue eyes that reminded you of the waters around you and tanned skin from the sun. His left arm is no longer there, amputated? Or taken? You’re not sure. He was a handsome man? Merman…and this was your helper…

You stared at him for a few moments, jaw dropped, blinking almost to check that this wasn’t some sort of hallucination. “You’re real.”

“Of course I’m real, who else was feeding you?” It was one thing to imagine that he was real, to think you’ve seen things, to rationalise the fish that were left. It was another thing entirely to see him sat before you, to see a merman in full glory.

“I’ve managed….”

You’re a little offended at the suggestion that you need help, after all you’d made your fishing spear, you’d caught your own fish, you’d found fruit and root vegetables and water. You’d managed. But in those early days having a helping hand was certainly a godsend.

“I noticed, you humans have always been resourceful. I suppose you don’t need me anymore, doll.” He made to turn as if to go back into the ocean and you stepped forward quickly, terrified you were going to be left alone again on this blasted island.

“No! Please don’t go!” You watched him stop and turn to smirk at you realising that he had been teasing all along. It was a strange concept that the creatures from your fairy tales could tease and joke…but it was a welcome interaction.

“Why were you left here, little doll?” His head tilts in a way that says he’s curious, not threatening, not demeaning, just curious. And you’re curious too, curious about this name he’s taken to giving you, something that sounds so human from someone that isn’t. You are unsure about it. Names like that aren’t given lightly where you’re from they’re either demeaning, enticing, or from someone close to you. This somehow has a different sort of innocence to it.

“Doll?”

“You remind me of those china dolls your people make.” It was strange to think that he knew so much about humans and the things you made, but then you supposed a lot of those things ended up in the ocean when merchant ships were sunk in storms or by pirates. It wasn’t such a strange concept that he would come across such a thing.

“Creepy? Strange?” You remember always seeing those dolls in shop windows, too expensive for you to afford. They had always seemed strange to you, too real and yet not real enough. Glass eyes staring at you blankly. You’d never liked them.

“Sweet, cute. You humans are so delicate and yet you adapt, you are strong and delicate and it’s like a doll.” You can’t say you agree with his belief that dolls are cute, but nonetheless you feel yourself getting flustered at the compliment. You supposed that if you could find him handsome then the same could happen on his end towards you.

“What do people call you?” You ask, you can’t keep thinking of him as the merman or the helper. He has a name surely.

“Bucky.” It isn’t what you imagined a merperson would be called, but then you knew no real truths about them. Other than that they could indeed be beautiful, that they had beautiful tails and that maybe some of them were quite helpful.

“Bucky, my name is Y/N…” You’re not sure he’ll use it. He seems to like the moniker of doll for you instead, but it’s only polite to return a name with another name.

You take more steps towards him and he seems to encourage it smiling at you brighter each step until you’re in front of the rock so close that you could touch him if you wanted to. Up close he was even more beautiful, you could understand the stories of mermaids luring men to the ocean, such beauty was likely to draw you anywhere if you didn’t think properly.

“May I?” You reach a hand forward, you want to touch, to confirm this is real, solid…but your curiosity is also begging to be sated.

He nods his head with a smile and you carefully reach forward. The scales are warm beneath your hand, so incredibly warm, just like your own legs would be. There was strong muscle beneath the scales that shifted under your touch. They were smooth, like polished stone, and their colour shifted with the light. It was absolutely beautiful.

You jumped at the sensation of a finger poking at your cheek and you looked over to see him staring at you curiously. “I’ve only ever seen humans from afar…you’re soft.”

“You are too, here.” You point to his chest, although in truth he isn’t that soft. He is the same skin and muscle that you are made from, very much human, but obviously a lot stronger. Tougher and he smiles at you in a way that says ‘oh, my dear’, as if you were naïve enough to belief that he was truly soft.

The finger poking your cheek becomes a hand that trails over your skin curiously, pushing at soft flesh and prodding at times in places that make you giggle from the ticklish sensation. “Merpeople as you call us, we are much more…resilient. You get ill, you get hurt, we….are tougher. Stronger.” You don’t doubt that, you don’t doubt that even without legs and missing an arm he could hurt you badly simply without a thought. There’s something dangerous about him, but it’s a danger that makes you feel safe. You trust him. You trust that he wants to help you, that he’s curious and not dangerous to you at least.

It is strange having someone touch you, having someone this close. You’re unused to this. In your society things are more restricted, touch is for close friends, family, partners. Closeness is not for strangers, but you supposed that you weren’t in your society anymore. You could do anything you wanted. It was lawless and rule-less and so strange.

The hand finds its way into your hair, where it quickly becomes stuck. Your hair is knotted and matted from days without maintenance and care. It’s horrible and you hate it. It’s a source of embarrassment as Bucky stares at it between his fingers before pulling back and shifting his hand to a small bag at his side. It is made of some sort of netting and you watch as he pulls out a comb, bone by the looks of it and old.

“May I?” He throws the words back at you with a grin and you wonder if all merpeople are this cheeky or if it’s just a trait that he’s developed.

You nod and turn to make it easier for him to reach your hair. It hurts, the knots are large and it is slow going, each step of the way he apologises for the pain and works. Each section slowly being untangled. It’s strangely intimate but you rationalise that you need someone to help because your hair is so knotted you’d fail to do it on your own. You tell yourself that this is acceptable even though your 18th century sensibilities tell you that it’s not.

“Are you alone?” You ask as he works on another section of hair, you’re alone, but maybe he isn’t. Surely, merpeople have their own cities or communities, families. He seemed very social so it would only make sense that the rest of his species were as well. But it seemed better to ask and assume and you were curious about him.

“Alone? I’m with you.”

“I mean…do you have a community?” A family, a group of people to look after you. You had a family once, a community…now you have nothing. Now you don’t even have a city to live in, just an empty island.

“Ah, like those human towns? No. I did and then…they didn’t want me after I lost my arm.” You don’t understand. You don’t understand why they’d get rid of him simply for something like losing an arm. He seemed to be doing well, didn’t seem hindered by it nor a problem because of it and even if he was…human communities seemed far more forgiving, people looked after each other, after family regardless of their ability.

“Why?”

“They thought I was a liability, my friends tried to fight for me to stay, but…elders always get the final say.” He think back to Steve, to Natasha, to all his friends who had fought for him to stay and failed. It was alright, he was alright on his own…it was just lonely sometimes.

“They just kicked you out? But you...that’s not fair!” He had helped you survive and was still here himself, it seemed completely bizarre to you that they’d get rid of someone at all, let alone think he was a liability. But you didn’t understand it and maybe that was a cultural difference between you.

“It’s alright, doll. I’m fine on my own…and now I have you.” He finished the final section of hair, the last knot coming free. It was a relief, your hair felt better, freer and you just felt better for it.

“That means you’re not leaving me alone?” You turn back to face him. You hope he stays, it’s so lovely having someone to talk to again, having a person, a real person, tail or not, in front of you. It doesn’t help that he’s nice to look at and feeds you.

“I think we both need the interaction.”


	5. Part 5

For five days he comes back each one bringing fish, bringing little shiny trinkets that he watches you look at. He was always so eager to please and even when trinkets weren’t to your taste you expressed an enjoyment of them simply because you didn’t want to disappoint the merman and you were sure if you showed any dislike for it he would be upset. Bucky was as far as you could tell very sensitive, kind, charming in an odd sort of way considering he was overly curious about humans and had no real understanding of personal space. Although he’d quickly figured out to ask for permission before touching you.

You’re limited to where you can spend time due to his tail, usually he sits on the same rock and you sit beside him or nearby. You started bringing him shells in return for the things he brought and it’s not much but you try to find the prettiest ones and he seems to appreciate them even if you’re sure it’s silly to give a merman shells of all things.

“I want to show you something, little doll” He’s sat on the rock again smiling at you in theat way of his and you make your way over at his call. You still are unused to his level of undress, men’s chests were not a common sight for you and you’re still not sure how to respond to it. You simply try to focus on his face rather than anywhere else.

“Close your eyes.” You follow his orders and close them tightly, fighting that urge to open them.

You don’t hear any movement, and you’re not sure what he has to show you nor are you sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. With Bucky many things are confusing between the two of you, you do not have the same values or ideas and sometimes things can be strange, confusing.

“Open them.”

“Oh!” You open them only to close them shut again at the sight of Bucky with _legs,_ with _naked legs_ , and the appendage between them. You hadn’t seen a naked man before and you were sure this was something your mother warned you against growing up.

“You closed them again…why did you close them, I have legs!” You can hear the confusion in his voice because he is confused. He thought you’d be excited, after all he wanted to show you that Merpeople didn’t just have tails that they could do more than that, that he could do more, spend more time with you. He didn’t understand why you’d looked so horrified.

You keep your eyes closed hearing him walk towards you having jumped off the rock. “Bucky…humans, we don’t…we don’t walk around naked. Women aren’t…supposed to see men like…that.” That is for husband and wife you think, after marriage, in bed. Not for strangers or even friends or even family. You weren’t supposed to see him like this.

“Oh…I’ve offended you?”

“Not per say, but I’m a little uncomfortable with it.” You hear a splash and open your eyes at the sound only to see him gone and you fear you’ve scared him away again. It’s not that he was unattractive, but it was a strange occurrence to see a naked man and you weren’t… you weren’t quite comfortable with it. You wanted to be as honest as possible with Bucky, you knew that mostly he’d appreciate it, but now you feared you’d upset him.

You slump your shoulders and turn around to walk back to your little camp, you sit there for a while just whittling away at your fishing spear and wondering if you could have been less…abrasive? You hadn’t meant to upset him, it had just been a natural thing to react like that. Naked men weren’t something you were used to.

“Is this better?” You jump at the voice and turn around on instinct. Bucky is back, legs still there, but this time he has a pair of sopping wet trousers on. You’re not sure where he finds the clothes or any of the things, but you think perhaps it is better not to ask.

“Yes…I didn’t offend you, did I?” You’re scared that at any moment you’re going to do something, say something that will lose your only companion. He is a godsend, someone to talk to whether he has legs or a tail or anything else.

“Of course not, I forget that you humans are more sensitive to some things. Strange people.” Part of you bristles at being called sensitive, but you know he doesn’t mean it to be mean, he means it as one learning a new species and their quirks.

“Do all merpeople have legs?” You ask him as he sits down beside you, his toes splaying against the sand. It’s like he’s stretching, almost like he hasn’t walked around on his legs in a long time.

“We can all change at will, we don’t anymore, not often…” You watch his arm play with the sand by your feet, he seems to be comparing them to his own. He looks so utterly human like this that it’s strange to think that he’s not, that he lives underwater, that he can breathe underwater, that he has a big fish tail, that…that those toes aren’t human toes, but perhaps imitations of human toes…or maybe merpeople were originally humans or vice versa? Who knew?

“Why?” You poke his hand with your foot, permission for him to be curious as he pokes at your toes and makes your foot jerk away at the ticklish sensation of a finger trailing over the sole. You, despite the previous incident, are comfortable around Bucky and don’t mind his curious touches because you know they’re completely innocent in their curiosity.

“Humans hurt us…sailors stealing scales, taking merfolk for brides, some even tried to eat us…it was safer in the end to stay in the water.” It’s moments like this that the childlike image of him falls away and you’re reminded that he is an adult, an adult who has seen more horrific things than you ever have.

“I’m sorry…I…” You feel unexplainably guilty even though you have never done any of those things, even though to you merpeople had simply been a myth and not something you could ever hurt. Until now, of course.

“You are not the humans that did those things. You aren’t to blame, although I appreciate the sentiment…we haven’t been nice to your people either.”

“Those stories…of merpeople drowning sailors…?” Tales your grandmother would tell you on cold, stormy nights. How men were lured off ships by visions of beautiful women with beautiful tails and drowned in the waves.

“Some of us are violent, unruly, cruel. It’s a small minority, much like your own, but they hurt you. Wrong is on both sides I suppose, little doll.” You smile at him, you’re not sure if it relieves the tension in the air, but you want it to. There is a dark history between your people that you never even knew of.

“Is that…is that what happened to your arm? Humans?” You have previously avoided talking about his missing left arm, unsure if it was a delicate topic he wished to avoid, but the air is already heavy and it seems appropriate to ask given the topic of conversation.

“Yes…I was young, naïve, I thought approaching a ship would be a good idea…it couldn’t be saved…even with my ability to heal.”

“I’m sorry”

“It is not your fault, it’s mine and the men who did it. I was stupid, young…” He remembers his complete curiosity, he still has some of it, but he knows better than to just go forward with it now. He knows to way up the risks. To think before he does.

“And yet you came to me?”

“You are one human, barely able to catch more than a handful of fish…you were never a threat.” You understand that, you weren’t terrifying or intimidating, you weren’t stronger than him, nor did you have a proper weapon. It was wiser to approach you than to approach a ship filled with armed sailors.

The two of you sit there for a while in silence contemplating the situation, the information, the past between your people, until he offers to brush your hair again. Each day he does this, to keep on top of the knots. You appreciate it, appreciate the help. He doesn’t mind, he likes hair, but dry hair is different from hair underwater and he takes joy in helping you. He has grown fond of you, of the things you are embarrassed by, the way you won’t look below his neck, and the way you try so hard to be good at things he will always be better at, like fishing.

There is something about you, curious and strange, and so human that he likes. His parents, were they still around, would curse him for being stupid enough to get this close to a human, but he knew you were harmless. You could barely catch fish let alone hurt him. He trusted you. You had an innocent heart, you just wanted company.

He just wanted company too.


	6. Part 6

“Your people live in houses?” You look up from the fish your cooking to Bucky, he has the same sopping wet pair of trousers on as last time, and he appears to prefer talking to you like this, with legs and not a tail. It’s hard for you to adjust to the idea that he’s a merman who doesn’t always have a tail.

“Yes, buildings, what about merfolk? Do you have buildings under the sea?” You supposed they must have some sort of shelter even if weather wasn’t a problem, surely other sea creatures might be, and maybe family groups wanted their own privacy. On this island you didn’t have a house. You had a little camp which consisted of a camp fire you lit every night, a small collection of fruit and veg on a big leaf from a tree, your fishing spear, and a makeshift lean to you’d made in case it did start raining.

“We use the rocks and the coral that are already there, find little spaces and make them our own. Similar to your towns but not quite the same. You need a house, little doll? In case of…what’s the word…?” You watch him gesture to the sky.

“Weather?”

“In case of bad weather!” You realise there are many words he knows but doesn’t really know because they aren’t relevant in his everyday life. He would have no reason to regularly use the word weather and it makes sense that a word you know so well is one he barely remembers. He’s joy at having found it makes you smile.

“Probably, a house would be…good, but I’m not a builder, I don’t make houses and I’m unsure how…” You know the basic idea, get a structure, and fit things together to make them stable. But you’ve never built any sort of building and so you know anything you do will not be perfect nor wonderful…but a building of any sort, a building to shelter you from the cold and the rain would be good. It would make this island more of a home, more stable. You could live here, you know you could. It might not be perfect nor as easy as living in a city, but living on the island came with its own perks, Bucky being one of them.

“You need human tools?”

“An axe, maybe? Something to cut down trees to…to get the wood to make it, maybe a chisel? A hammer…? Logs could work to make a house, use sticks to peg them together maybe?” You’re talking to yourself as you contemplate how to make a house with what you have. You don’t have bricks nor a way to make bricks, but logs you can get if you have a way of cutting a tree down…which you don’t.

“I can get them. Tools. I know how to get them…” He looks proud of himself, that he can help and you’re glad he can help. You know that he is the reason you have so many things, that he helps you have things that make your life here more comfortable. You’ve settled with the understanding that you may never leave the island, that ships do not cross the islands path often and that thus you need to make it your home.

You don’t want to be stranded, you want to make a life here. You want to make the best of a bad situation.

“Where?”

“Ships drop things all the time, crash, sink, things sit at the bottom of the ocean, I collect them.” You’re relieved that he doesn’t do something like go to actual towns and steal, you don’t want him to get caught and it makes more sense for him to get things from the ocean, rejected or lost things.

“Is that where you found the clothes? The trinkets?” You pull at the clothes you’re wearing, the set he brought you that had been sopping wet and new. The warmer waters of the world were charted and dangerous. Rocks and reefs and it was no surprise that many merchant ships sunk especially with tropical storms.

“Yes, I find lots of things, some unusable, those spices and foods, but clothes are still wearable, and shiny things are still shiny.”

“I’d…I would appreciate it if you could find me some tools, Bucky, so I could make a house…a building. I could bring you fruits from the island, you like them, yes?”

“I like the sweet ones.” He points to a fruit, green in colour, almost scale like in pattern. You had been foraging it and it was sweet. Strange for you, not like European fruits, but lovely nonetheless. You’d taken to keeping extra after Bucky had tried some. He liked it a lot. He quite liked a lot of land fruits and vegetables you’d found.

“I’ll get you more in payment for the tools…”

“I would do it without a trade, little doll, I want to help you.” He brushes your shoulder with his, a sort of comforting gesture. You’ve grown increasingly used to his touches, you don’t mind them anymore in fact you’re

“We’re friends.”

“Of course.” You smile at him, at his answer and despite your usual discomfort around breaking personal boundaries you hug him. Like you used to hug your father, your mother, your siblings, your childhood friend a few doors down. You hugged him and felt him still for a moment, confused by your sudden physical affection, before wrapping his arm around you and hugging you back.

It is nice to hug again. To receive physical comfort, the need for which had been like an ache in your chest that you’d been trying to ignore for the two weeks you’d been on this island and survived. 

Bucky stays with you that night, by the fire. The two of you talk about your lives, about the stories of your people, the differences and the similarities. He too wonders if merfolk weren’t once humans who grew so fond of the sea. It is nice to fall asleep with another person there, not alone.

He leaves your island the next day, trousers left on the rock as he swims away in search of tools. You do not see him for hours, it is only when the sun begins to go down that he comes back with some very familiar items. An axe, a chisel, a hammer, they are basic tools but they’re what you need and you thank him with a pile of the sweet fruit he loves so much. You discuss your plans to build over fruit and the fire.

You plan to make it simple at first, perhaps over time you’d improve upon it, but at the moment all you desire is a one room shack made of wood with a roof above your head. Enough to keep you dry if a storm hits. He offers to help you build and you’re grateful, you know that it will take twice as long to build on your own and that Bucky is much stronger than you are. His help will almost definitely be necessary to lift and build higher up.

You are excited. Excited at the prospect of making a home, a shelter. You are excited at your new found friendship, at the way life is going. Things are starting to seem less bleak each day and Bucky is to thank for that.


	7. Part 7

It takes you weeks. It takes days simply to chop enough wood down, Bucky takes over that job after realising you would take even longer, even one handed he chops wood quicker than you do with two. You instead work on finding sticks to chisel into pegs to keep the logs together, work on finding sap you can use to water proof the wood from the elements. It is a team effort in which he does the heavy lifting and you do the more technical work. You make it just at the edge of the beach where sand becomes soil and stone.

Each night the two of you are exhausted, sitting down to eat a meal of fish (raw for Bucky and cooked for you), fruit and root veg. You wonder if you can grow your own, make a garden to help cultivate more. But first you need to finish the house and finish it you do. Slowly, with great strain to your muscles and with multiple splinters and cuts which you bathe in salt water and try to keep clean. You manage this surprisingly well, never getting an infected cut due to your diligence.

You grow closer over the building, you joke and laugh, hug and talk. He stays more often on the island overnight, sometimes in the shallows with his tail and sometimes on the beach with you with his legs. You share food together and each day you grow closer and each day you long for something you’re not quite sure of. It is a longing in your chest, one you recall others discussing in relation to future husbands, future wives. A desire to be closer, to love them as more than a friend. It scares you as a concept because Bucky is not human and you are not sure he has the same longing towards you, human. You are both so different and you fear that that will stop any chance of more than friendship.

You are also scared of scaring your only companion away. You don’t wish to be alone again and so you do not wish to make any advances. You are content with friendship, with companionship. With late night talks, sharing food, and building shelters.

“We’ve done well.” You’re proud as you praise both of you, the house in front of you is of a reasonable size, one room, with a makeshift door, and a solid roof. The wood has been covered in sap from a few trees the two of you tapped. It glues the wood together and makes it resistant to water. You are happy. You wish only to add to it, to make a bed, to make all sorts of comforts that you do not have. To be self-sufficient and live happily, to make this island your home even if it is hotter than your old home, even if food is different and the sea warm.

“We have, I’m proud of us, little doll.” You’re proud of each of you as well. Proud of the way he smiles at you, happy, content. Proud of the little house you now have, of the way you’ve moved forward, of your friendship.  

“I’m going to stay here, Bucky. I’m going to stay on this little island and make a home.” You decide. The city is hard as well, little pay, little food, a one room house with rent that increases in price each day. Restrictions on what you, a woman can do. The island is hard too, but it’s a different hard, a hard that provides an element of freedom that you accept and are happy to take.

You are not alone in that hardship here either. Bucky is there, Bucky is a helping hand. In the city with no family left no one wishes to help you. All too concerned with their own troubles to do that. In a way the island is easier.

He steps closer to you, blocking your view of the little shack you’d now call home. “I’m glad…your company is pleasant, doll.”

“Only pleasant?” You joke, nervous of the closeness and the intensity with which he is looking at you. It’s almost predatory and it’s strange…because he is so often light hearted, childlike, innocent, even though you know he’s perhaps less innocent and naïve than you are.

“Extremely…enjoyable.” He leans closer and you pull back nervous at how close his face is to you. You are not sure if he’s teasing your or simply doesn’t understand the weight of his words, part of is pretty sure he’s teasing. That he is tempting you because he knows your internal struggle. You want to kiss him. You shouldn’t. You know you shouldn’t, that you should avoid that ever happening because doing such a thing to make him swim away, could remove your only friend on this island.

“Bucky…”

“Little doll...” He doesn’t move away, if anything he appears to move closer, his face but mere inches away from your own. You can feel his breath on your skin, his blue eyes are even bluer up close…you close your eyes as if that will remove the temptation in front of you, as if not seeing him will help.

His hand falls on your shoulder and you jump at the sudden contact eyes still closed. His thumb rubs circles into the cloth covering your shoulder and it’s relaxing. You find your shoulders slumping despite yourself, your guard slowly slipping until your opening your eyes to him again. He is smiling at you softly.

“You don’t have to be scared. I’m not leaving.” You believe him as he inches closer that hand moving down your arm and to your waist.  You realise that he wants this. The temptation is not just your own, the longing is not just your own. He wants more. You want more. He won’t run. He won’t leave. He intends to stay, a merman intending to stay on an island with you, a human. It is strange and thrilling and you want this.

“Promise?”

He doesn’t answer in words, instead slanting his lips against yours. It is a strange sensation, one you’ve never felt before. His lips are chapped from years of sea water, cold and wind. The scruff on his jaw scratches your skin, his long hair tickles your cheeks. It is a nice sensation, the feeling of skin against skin, lips against lips, a warm tongue reaching out to touch yours. It is feeling. It is…love. You won’t tell him that, as free with his feelings as he is. This is new to you, strange, against everything you’ve known to be proper and right and you love it. You love the feeling of his hand on your waist, the warmth of his breath, the touch of his mouth.

You are glad he is staying, that you are staying…that you are going to make a home.


	8. Part 8

You are warm as you wake, blinking the sleep from your eyes as you lift yourself onto your elbows. The shack, your home, is dark, light filtering in only slightly through gapes around the door and walls. The blankets Bucky has found are soft beneath your hands. You trail your eyes around the shack, small and dark, and Bucky is there beside you. His arm is still thrown over your waist despite your movements and he is sleeping peacefully. After that first kiss you found closeness more common and it was only common sense for Bucky to sleep beside you in the shack rather than outside in the dark and the cold.

You have readily admitted to yourself that you love him. You love his cheeky ways, the way he pushes knowing you’re unsure or concerned due to previous ideas of propriety. You love the curiousness he has about humans, about stories and cities and the shiny trinkets he finds. You love that he cares, that he wishes to help, that he’s always helped. That he teaches you how to fish better, that he teaches you how to swim better, that he teaches you that seaweed is edible, that there are things you can harvest from the ocean that you never thought of doing before. You love that he is warm beside you at night, that a fire is not necessary when you are curled together in your home. You love his love of fruit. You love his desire to learn how to forage for human food, how to plant. You love every aspect, the human and the merperson.

You take his arm from around your waist and lay it beside him carefully, trailing your fingers across his cheek, watching him sleep for a moment before standing and stretching. The sun has risen outside and you close the door behind you careful not to wake him. The house has held up through one rain fall already and you began an experimental garden planting the seeds of fruit that you’ve eaten.

There is work to do around the island, foraging mostly, collecting firewood for cooking, and fishing food for breakfast, lunch and dinner. You wish ships would come past simply so you could trade, coconuts for books, for seeds from plants you miss eating, for more clothes, for a real bed perhaps, for little things you can’t quite get on your own.

You think that one day they might come past, you hope that if any do they respect your little island, your little home. You know men, you know they can be greedy, that they will take what they want and can ruin what you’ve built. Bucky knows this better than you.

You are foraging in the woods, collecting fruits in a basket you weaved together from leaves. There is a particularly annoying sweet fruit that is too high for you to reach even jumping and it frustrates you so much you do not give up. Until a hand reaches up and plucks it for you placing it in the basket.

“Good morning, little doll” A kiss is press to your cheek and you turn to return the favour. He still calls you that, still reminds you that he see your people as delicate and small, and it doesn’t annoy you anymore. Because it’s true. He is infinitely stronger than you, he is a magnificent swimmer. Even his tail could break your bones. Doll is apt in comparison to him.

“Good morning, Bucky.”

You walk together, him reaching for fruits you can’t until your basket has enough for the day. You pick the ripest, ensuring the other fruit is good for days to come. You have to be wise about what you consume, that much you know. You avoid greed knowing that food is only what nature can provide and that eating too much too quickly removes food for another day while more grows.

“Humans have bonding? Yes? You…you call it something different…”

“Marriage? Where two people share rings and vows and promise to love and protect each other until death?” You’re not sure if he means bonding as in building relations or bonding as in marriage. Creating a strong bond between two people. Marriage, serious, real. Something that really won’t happen for you, not legally anyway. The island has no priests, no one to do such a ceremony. But you don’t care. Simply being around Bucky is enough, even if your mother is probably rolling in her grave with displeasure.

You watch him turn your words over in his head, deciding if that is what he means by bonding. If the merfolk idea lines up with the human idea. “In many ways…promise to love and care. To be faithful. So, yes, human marriage.” He decides that marriage is much like bonding, enough that they can both understand the importance of it, the gravity. It is hard sometimes to cross the cultural divide between your two species, to make you both understand different and yet similar concepts.

“Why do you ask?” The two of you step back out onto the beach. You know why he asks…it’s not simple curiosity. Living together, loving each other…it makes sense that he would wish to make some sort of formal commitment even if no one else is around to acknowledge it but the two of you.

“I wish to bond with you…to…to show my commitment. You are my joy when the world was lonely and dark…you arrived on this island and I grew happy again.” You understood that loneliness well, understood how one person changed it all, how he had changed it all for you. How you’d gone from lonely, scared on this island on your own, eager to leave it, to eager to stay, to happy, to fulfilled.

“How…how to merfolk bond? Humans exchange rings in front of a…a religious man, we say words…” Marriage is a complex concept in reality, so many aspects that Bucky does not know about that make it up and you stick to the basic concepts knowing that those are ones he would understand.

“We share a piece of ourselves, a scale usually. We give it to the other and they give theirs to us…it symbolises giving part of our…” He points at his chest, perhaps heart, but you know better. Not heart, but “Soul?”

“Part of our soul.” He nods at your choice of word. Soulmates is perhaps the equivalent to human culture you think. Giving the person you love part of yourself, to share part of yourself with another, to be meant for another wholeheartedly.

“I don’t have scales…but I...I have hair?” You wonder if giving a strand of hair enough, if cutting some off is worthy of receiving a scale. In your world keeping hair is often to remember the dead, to memorialise someone, to keep a piece of them after they are gone. It is not a joyous thing, but maybe it can be.

“That is a fair trade I think…” He smiles at you softly, brushing your hair with his fingers, “Do you wish to bond with me?” He knows the answer, you know the answer. The answer is in your soft gaze, it is in the way you curl up beside him at night. It is in everything you do and everything he does.

“Yes…” You do, so much. To make a commitment to someone who means so much…you want to be his bonded, his wife, even if wife is not a term he understands. You want to forever be around him, to watch him swim, to try to swim with him, to forage in the wood together, to lie together at night. You wish to do these things forever, to revel in this love, this strange, new, different love.

You walk backwards from him with a smile, a promise to be back as you hurry to the shack grabbing the knife you fashioned from flint before rushing back outside. He is on the rock again, his legs have gone in favour of that tail, pearlescent, silvery blue, strong and yet delicate.

You stand in front of the rock and take the knife to your hair, cutting a chunk free, it is strange to look at your own hair in your hands, but this is part of the bonding and while it is not the traditional rings you are used to you don’t mind this. Rings are not something the two of you have, although you are sure Bucky could find some lost to the sea if he wanted.

You watch his discomfort as he plucks a scale from his tail, a more painful process than cutting your hair, more meaningful you think, but you do not have something of equal worth to give him. “Here, little doll...” He holds out the shining scale to you in the palm of his hand and you take it, replacing it with the lock of your hair.

You can feel the meaning of this moment in your chest, the important of giving part of yourself to someone, the symbolism. You can feel the importance of this scale, has a merperson ever given a scale freely to a human? Has it been centuries?  How long?

You watch his tail return to legs, watch and follow Bucky towards the house with a smile. You watch him shift through the trinkets he has brought you until he finds a locket. You watch him carefully place the lock of hair inside it and latch it around his neck, the pendant resting above his heart.

“You are forever with me now.”

“And you with me, Bucky.” You pull him close, rest your forehead against his and breathe. This moment is perfect, this is a home now, a family. You and him and this little house on the beach.


	9. Part 9| Epilogue

Months later and your island has become more sufficient, better. The shack is a bigger house now, with separate rooms. You have a real bed, wooden, with a mattress you traded from the ship that stops at your island regularly.

The merchant ship that stops at your island is one that you helped when they needed water. They had used all their water up, not truly anticipating the heat, the thirst. You provided them with water, fresh food and in return each journey they stop at your island provide you with books, clothes, tools, furniture and materials. Things you cannot get elsewhere. They give you want you need and you return it. They keep your island a secret. Not only for your benefit but because they know that ensures they are the only ship allowed to trade with you for water and food.

Your island is a home, even more so than before. You are thriving, you and Bucky. You teach him to read human words, you sit together at night with a book between the two of you, he learns words he never knew and in return he teaches you about his people, about the myths, the tales, the words that no human can sound out.

Thriving trade helps you create a home, it helps you make what you need, grow what you need, live, not simply survive. The merchant knows you and Bucky as husband and wife, bands of gold found under the sea upon your fingers, his scale on a chain around your neck, your hair in a locket around his own. They believe you married before being stranded here, they do not know the truth nor do they need to. Only you and Bucky need know that.

You contemplate having a child with Bucky, but are too scared to do such a thing just yet. The island is harsh, not so harsh for adults, but a child you are sure would struggle. You want to be sure you are prepared for it, prepared for the chance that any child you have could die but a mere few days, weeks, or even years old.

You don’t discuss it with Bucky yet, you are sure merfolk do not suffer as common child death as humans and you want to be sure in your own conviction first before you discuss it. Despite this, this island is your home.

You are not stranded anymore, you are home. With love by your side, food in your belly, water in your mouth, and clothes on your back.


End file.
